


Ghosts and grossling

by lwise2019



Series: Mikkel's Story [21]
Category: Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-20
Updated: 2020-01-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:21:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22327000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lwise2019/pseuds/lwise2019
Summary: Reynir sees ghosts and Sigrun is bitten.
Series: Mikkel's Story [21]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1536739
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Ghosts and grossling

With everyone safely in the tank, Tuuri and Sigrun went to the front to get the tank moving while Mikkel rechecked that everything was properly stowed in case of more rough roads, Emil lay down on his bunk out of the way, and Reynir scooped up the kitten and took her forward with him for company while he watched over Tuuri's shoulder.

As they moved through the remains of the grossling nest, there was a grinding noise as something dragged across the top of the tank, followed by several resounding crashes behind them. Emil leapt to his feet while Mikkel instinctively ducked and shielded his head. When nothing else happened, they looked at each other with identical embarrassed expressions. Sitting back down on his bunk, Emil paused, frowning at Lalli who had not responded at all to the sound, and turned to Mikkel worriedly, “Is he hurt? I mean … concussion … or something?”

“No, there's a field test for concussion and I checked. He's okay, just very tired. Let him sleep.”

If either had gone forward at that moment, or if Sigrun had turned to look back at the other passengers, someone would have seen the kitten, eyes wide and all her fur standing on end in the instinctive feline response to the nearness of grosslings. Reynir, from the safest country in the world, failed to recognize the meaning of her response, thought she was merely alarmed by the sound, and whispered soothingly to her. If one of the others had seen her before she relaxed as the tank carried her away from the grossling, however, later events might have played out quite differently.

Or perhaps not. Perhaps some events are simply fated. Only the gods could say.

* * *

Lalli's new camp site was not far from the parking garage, a large eight-sided plaza with a statue in the middle, buildings on four wide sides, and broad avenues leading out through four narrow sides. As soon as Tuuri brought the tank to a stop (only slightly bumping into one of the bollards around the statue), Sigrun instructed her, “Hey, fuzzy-head, go ask your cousin if he saw anything of concern in those buildings.”

Emil and Mikkel watched somewhat anxiously as Tuuri shook Lalli by the shoulder, but he came awake and answered her whispered question before rolling over and pulling the covers up around his ears. Mikkel was just a little relieved by this response, not that he'd actually _doubted_ the field test, but it was still reassuring to see that the younger man was in fact sleeping and not unconscious. Emil was likewise relieved as he hadn't really trusted Mikkel's casual dismissal of possible injury in the first place.

As Tuuri reported nothing alarming, the five conscious team members piled out of the tank into the snow, just under knee-deep even on Tuuri, and Sigrun, surveying the site, concluded, “All right then. This place looks good enough, I suppose. The little mage guy's got us four escape routes _and_ a clear field of fire. Too bad there aren't any book spots around here, but maybe there's something in one of those buildings that the elderly folks didn't know about. We might as well take a look since we're here.”

Behind Mikkel, Reynir and Tuuri speculated in Icelandic about the riches within the buildings, while Sigrun more practically speculated about whether anyone would have been likely to stay in them during the Great Dying, the last days of the Old World as it succumbed to the Rash. Mikkel doubted that many would have stayed – even the people of the Old World surely didn't keep working when they were sick – but _not many_ did not mean _none_ , and there was always the possibility of a wandering grossling seeking shelter, or even a patient in a makeshift clinic that didn't quite die.

Reynir interrupted them, grabbing Sigrun's shoulder and pointing urgently at the westernmost building. “I saw something move over there!” Sigrun of course did not understand his words, but on the simultaneous translation from Mikkel and Tuuri, she simply sighed and directed Emil, “You protect the helpless ones while we check it out.”

Mikkel ducked into the tank to grab his crowbar then joined Sigrun in following Lalli's tracks to the offending building. The large picture windows, surprisingly unbroken, were crusted with dirt but still let in enough light for their investigation. Dagger drawn, Sigrun stepped to the side and then, when Mikkel shoved the door open, jumped in, ready for anything.

But there was nothing. She stood still, Mikkel's bulk at her back, and peered about, listening and even sniffing the air. After several seconds, she murmured, “Okay, I see nothing that points to recent activity in here, except little guy's footprints. You spot anything?” and “I do not,” he murmured in reply.

They found themselves in a large high-ceilinged lobby with several doors opening off of it, but even in the dim light from the windows, they could see undisturbed dust in front of those doors. The middle of the room was taken up with multiple gurneys with sheet-covered skeletons. Such sights were familiar to them; like so many public places of the Old World, it had been converted into an impromptu hospital, for even as their civilization collapsed, the people of the Old World had tried to provide proper care to the afflicted. Signaling Mikkel to go right as she went left, Sigrun led a rapid search of the room, checking under each bed and looking suspiciously up at the ceiling. But again, there was nothing.

Sigrun returned to the large front door to shrug elaborately at Reynir, still waiting anxiously by the tank, but rather than being reassured, he pointed so urgently behind her that she and Mikkel both spun around, weapons ready, expecting that something had crept up behind them. Still, there was nothing.

Giving Mikkel a disgusted look and an eye-roll, Sigrun gestured to Reynir to come look for himself. With the expression of a condemned man, the Icelander crossed the plaza, mounted the steps, and peered inside, still cuddling the kitten as if he had forgotten that he had her. “I – I'm sorry,” he quavered, “it's just … ghosts?”

“Ghosts,” Mikkel repeated in Danish, putting a hand to his head. _We have a scout who thinks he's a mage and mutilates grosslings and hangs out in trees in the freezing cold. Our driver agrees he's a mage. Our Cleanser can blow up a building with a few incendiaries. And our stowaway thinks he's a mage too and he thinks he sees ghosts. Can this situation get any more silly?_

“Ghosts?” Sigrun repeated. “Ask him if they look mean.” _Yes, the situation can get more silly. Our captain believes in ghosts too._ As he turned to Reynir, his pendant shifted, still very cold. _Oh, and who am I to talk? I'm wearing a Thor's hammer for protection._

Mikkel sighed. “Do the 'ghosts' appear hostile?”

“Uh … no? They just kinda sit there and flicker a little.”

“He says no.”

Sigrun frowned slightly, clearly perceiving that there was somewhat more to the answer than that, but then shrugged and turned away. If the ghosts were no threat, then they were also of no interest. Reynir seemed to suddenly recall the kitten in his hands, gave her a kiss, and whispered reassurances to her.

The skeletons had caught Sigrun's attention and this in turn drew the attention of the two men. “Did they _all_ die from the illness?” Reynir asked in appalled tones.

“No,” Mikkel stated positively, “Remains from victims of the illness have plenty of prominent identifiers, most notably calcified tissue remains and deformities of the joints. These individuals look too clean. They were, however, ill at some point. See these small structural anomalies of the bone? A relatively early stage of the illness. But no, they did not die from it.”

“Huh,” Reynir acknowledged.

Sigrun had, of course, followed none of the Icelandic conversation, but from their gestures she had a pretty clear idea of the topic. “So hey, you,” she asked curiously, “what do you think these guys died from?”

“Euthanasia” was the word on Mikkel's lips, but he caught himself in time, remembering that Reynir would recognize the word. Icelanders, he knew, were sensitive about that word since their ancestors had “euthanized” (that is to say, killed without warning) anyone who approached their island for decades after the Rash struck. “Other causes,” he thought, was the safest response.

“And that's scientist speak for …?”

“It means I don't know,” Mikkel answered coolly. It was true, of course, that he didn't _know_. History was clear, but he didn't know about this specific case. “And I'm not a scientist,” he added, rightly expecting to distract her.

“Scientist, doctor, same thing as far as I'm concerned,” she observed, and he wondered anew at her failure to read any of the team's records. Perhaps, he thought, she'd expected this team to have been as carefully selected as those made up of her friends, family, and neighbors, and even the experiences of the past few days hadn't quite conveyed to her just how poorly the expedition had been organized.

“Also not a doctor.” He didn't want to go into the details of his brief medical training.

“Ssooo … veterinarian then?” She sounded more curious than displeased. Given the sort of injuries they might expect, he supposed a veterinarian might well be as useful as a doctor. But he wasn't that either, to be honest.

“I have assisted in several cow births back home.” That at least was true.

They were there to check out the room, and he turned to examine some interesting medical supplies. If they had had a supply line, he would have packed up the syringes to return to Bornholm for cleaning and sterilization, for though Bornholm could produce them, still they were in short supply and valuable. Without the necessary tools, though, he couldn't risk using them. He sighed and returned them to their boxes.

“Okay, look, here's what I'm really asking: If something needs to be amputated, can I count on you or does someone else have to do the chopping?”

He did not answer for a moment.

> The Madsen family was lucky in being mostly composed of immunes, but even they had their non-immunes. The immunes usually did their best to shield the non-immunes, but Bornholm was quite safe these days, safe enough that non-immune Petter was permitted to go out collecting firewood with slightly older Mikkel and an old tomcat. They were both strong young men and Mikkel could even chop down trees so long as no one stood nearby (and no one did!) so the arrangement worked well for weeks.
> 
> It worked well until the day that something long and thin, that perhaps decades ago had been a weasel, streaked out from under a root directly at Petter. The tomcat was too old, too slow, and the Beast sank its teeth into Petter's ankle just above his boot. Mikkel whirled and struck by instinct, grabbed the fainting boy, and ran while the tomcat dealt with the Beast. Mikkel thanked all the gods that he didn't believe in that for once his aim had been true, taking off Petter's leg just below the knee.
> 
> Petter lived, and he didn't suffer the Rash. He and his parents had thanked Mikkel with tears in their eyes. There are far worse fates in the world than going through life with a wooden leg, but still --

Mikkel didn't like to think about amputation. He schooled his face and voice to reveal nothing, and answered steadily, “I don't need credentials to be a decent healer and medic. I'll amputate as needed.”

“Good, I'll trust you.”

Not that she had much choice, he thought, as he was the only person on the team with any real training. “Thank you.” He looked down at the next box of medicines and realized that it was different. The label was handwritten and difficult to read, both because it had faded over the decades and because it appeared to have been written in haste. “Now this here is interesting,” he mused. Nearby was a loose piece of paper, set out as if to draw attention. “And this.”

He lifted the paper and began to read, the faded ink making it difficult. “If any of you wake up, don't be alarmed, we didn't leave you for dead! But the food has run scarce and we've received word that the troops at Kastellet have decided to abandon their cause and move on. We need to venture further out to find supplies, but we're not giving up on you, not now.”

“And then they never came back. Good story,” Sigrun shrugged.

Mikkel didn't answer. Sigrun could find grossling nests with the best of them and had an enviable record of wiping them out, but she had an entirely straightforward way of looking at the world. She had never spent time trying to understand the assumptions that people of the Old World had held. She didn't see what Mikkel saw in that short note.

It had been written late in the Great Dying. Troops were retreating, food was scarce. They knew by then that Rash patients didn't wake up, not ever. But the writer thought that these patients might. That meant something, Mikkel was sure. And the last words – “not now” – why had the writer written that? What was happening there, then, during the Great Dying? And what did the patients die of, if not the Rash or, it seemed, euthanasia? Mikkel slipped the hand-labeled box into his satchel for further examination as Sigrun lead the way back out of the building.

Reporting on the event that evening, Mikkel acknowledged that they had allowed themselves to be lulled into complacency by the weather, and that it was only the alarm raised by the kitten that had saved them. He passed over in silence the fact that Reynir's background was so sheltered that he had no idea how cats reacted to the presence of grosslings. Fortunately no one asked Mikkel to explain what the non-immune civilian was doing investigating a building, carrying a kitten or no.

It was the most pleasant day they'd had so far in the Silent World. The air was cold but tolerable in the absence of wind, and the sun sparkled on the fresh snow, unmarred by any but their own tracks. It was a rare time when even the non-immunes felt safe outside.

”She's doing this again,” Reynir commented in a puzzled tone. Looking back at the kitten, which was exhibiting extreme alarm, Mikkel and Sigrun both went on alert. Even Tuuri and Emil, chatting by the tank, saw their response and began looking around for danger. Studying their tracks, Sigrun nudged Mikkel, pointed to disturbed snow, and whispered, “Something's followed us here.”

It was immediately obvious that the building behind them, though closer than the tank, was not defensible as any large grossling would likely be able to break a window, and in any case their party was too small to risk splitting their forces. Standing still was likely to be suicidal, but at least they could be silent, or nearly so, in making their way back to the tank. Mikkel mentally kicked himself for letting protocol slip to the point that Reynir and Tuuri were outside but not wearing their masks. At least they had their masks around their necks, and he was able to remedy the situation at least partially by putting Reynir's mask on properly. He didn't dare draw attention by shouting at Tuuri to put hers on and could only hope she would think of that by herself.

They had nearly made it to the tank when the grossling, a flat monstrosity resembling a multi-legged manta ray, lunged at Reynir from its hiding place in the snow. Of course it lunged at Reynir; grosslings always knew who was not immune. Mikkel spun, yanking Reynir back and away, but knew he was too slow … and Sigrun thrust her arm in the monster's maw, falling backward into Reynir but still having the presence of mind to slam the creature into the tank.

Emil had truly grown into a trollhunter for he ran forward firing into the grossling as it retreated, while Mikkel, seeing that Reynir's jacket was torn, yanked up his sleeve to check for injuries. Reynir's skin was unbroken and he had merely been spattered with blood – Sigrun's blood, but possibly contaminated. The cold air and the bright sun would kill the virus, Mikkel knew, so he muttered something reassuring and shoved Reynir into the tank behind Tuuri, who had wisely put on her mask and retreated to the tank. Mikkel knew there was no time to lose as he ran to help find the creature, which had disappeared again in the snow.

Sigrun was back on her feet and had snatched up the kitten, crying in the snow where Reynir had dropped it. Despite being untrained, the kitten had good instincts and alerted toward the hidden monster. Emil and Mikkel ran toward it, Emil still firing and Mikkel with his crowbar raised to strike.

Somehow it happened again as it happened so many times to Mikkel. He knew where he was aiming, where Emil was, where the grossling probably was, but somehow, somehow, his crowbar went to the left instead of the right and he felt and heard it strike Emil's leg.

Emil yelped in pain, Sigrun shouted at them both, and the grossling erupted from the snow with a screech and fled.

”You broke his leg?” Sigrun shouted in disbelief.

”I --”

> Mikkel was on Bornholm. Petter was down and howling in pain, the ax was heavy in Mikkel's hands, the grossling was ripping at the severed leg even as the tomcat pounced on it, and the blood ...

Mikkel was in Copenhagen, Emil was on the ground holding his leg, and the blood was from the grossling. “...no,” Mikkel managed. “That is highly unlikely.”

”At least it's injured,” Sigrun snarled. “Corner it and stomp it to death, maybe then you won't miss!”

”I,” Mikkel began, but there was really nothing more to say. “...yes. Will do.”

The grossling was fleeing across the snow now, too injured to burrow, making for the nearest shelter, the door they had left open. Mikkel and Sigrun were close behind, with Emil trailing along on his painful but not broken leg. The grossling had left smears of blood as it sought shelter under the cots and they had no difficulty following it.

”Did it just die?” Sigrun asked in confusion. They all knew that grosslings were exceedingly hardy and generally survived any injury that didn't destroy the brain, yet this one seemed to have curled up in death throes.

Mikkel took no chances, immediately stomping hard on every bit of the grossling. If it wasn't dead before, it certainly was now. Sigrun had seen and killed many grosslings and stated casually when he finished, “Well, that's handled. I'm getting hungry, let's go eat.”


End file.
